(they/they/theirs)
I am a trans/nonbinary (AFAB), queer, mixed race person, and a licensed independent clinical social worker (LICSW). I came to the work of therapy after a previous career in public service and conflict engagement/restorative justice. Joining others on the road through trauma into healing has become my life’s work and passion.
One of my core values is authenticity and I focus on using my identity and presence to create a true safe place for my clients, honoring and making space for all of the intersections of our being human in this complicated world. I work from a trauma-informed, harm reduction, and attachment-based perspective, and leverage my liberatory beliefs to dismantle the stigmas inherent in established models of care
I specialize in working with LGBTQ+ clients and clients with complex trauma and dissociation.
Read more about my Specialties and contact me for a consultation.
Our deepest hurts come from relationships and our truest healing can come through relationships. The goal of my practice is to offer my clients an experience of a true other within a securely attached therapeutic alliance, unlocking their potential to manifest their most resourced self.
The modality I use most is Accelerated Experiential Dynamic Psychotherapy (AEDP) and I am a level-2 trained AEDP therapist. AEDP is a modality that leverages the power of connection and relationship to provide healing experiences and increase our capacity for secure attachment. I work to shine a light on emotional experience in a way that feels new, safe, grounded, and connected.
Other modalities I use to support my work include Internal Family Systems (IFS) and Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT).
Together, these modalities emphasize the role of interpersonal relationships, how attachment informs our minds and hearts, how important our emotional experiences are to healing, and how all of the many aspects of ourselves are vital to the journey we are on.
I specialize in working with LGBTQ+ clients, especially those with complex experiences of trauma, dissociation, and plurality. Together with my clients, we explore identity, relationships, and how to heal within a societal structure that oppresses us.
Social Working Queer?
“A queer social worker queering social work” is not only my tagline, but also my mission.
Historically, “queer” has had different meanings, from the original adjective meaning “odd or eccentric” to its use as a slur in the 19th and 20th centuries. Starting in the 1980s, queer has begun to be reclaimed by members of the LGBTQ+ community, “disarming the word of its harmful power.” (Tilson, 2021, p. 13) Currently, we often see queer used as an umbrella term for members of our community, but it can also be used in another sense, to disrupt and destabilize societal norms.
Queer is a critique of identities, not an identity of its own; it stands in resistance to fixed categories; it stands against ‘normal’; and it signifies resistance to regimes of normativity.”
(Tilsen, 2021, p. 14)
My use of queer is this disruptive one. I use queer to question and suspend assumptions, to challenge all forms of the fixed and the binary and honor our varied intersections of identity (gender, sexuality, race, relationship structure, and more), to push back against white supremacy, patriarchy, and the other powerful societal structures that oppress us.
I use queer as both an adjective to describe myself and other members of my community, and as a verb that encapsulates the ways we can recreate our world. I strive to queer social work to specifically name and acknowledge how my profession has harmed marginalized communities and to help it evolve into a profession that works both with and for those same communities to help them meet their own self-determined needs and goals.
Reference: Tilsen, Julie. 2021. Queering Your Therapy Practice: Queer Theory, Narrative Therapy, and Imagining New Identities. Routledge.